Matthew Judon’s Surprise Statement Says It All After Patriots Loss

FOXBORO, Mass. — Before he took questions from reporters after another frustrating Patriots loss, Matthew Judon had something to say.

New England’s Pro Bowl edge rusher broke with tradition Sunday night by beginning his postgame news conference with an opening statement.

“Hold on,” Judon said after the Patriots lost to the Miami Dolphins 24-17 at Gillette Stadium to fall to 0-2 on the young season. “Before we get to the questions, we’re going to talk. We’re going to confuse everybody. We’re going to talk from a place of praise. We’re going to talk from a place of gratitude. We get to play this game.

“I know we lost. I know it looks bad when you start (0-2). But this is not a bad team, so don’t get to asking those kind of questions. We’re going to speak matter of fact, but I don’t think we’re about to hang our head up here or in that locker room.

“When we come back on Monday, tomorrow, and we watch this film, we’re going to get our corrections corrected. And when we come back on Wednesday, it’s not going to be able, ‘How are y’all going to pull it together?’ We already know how.

“We’ve got to just play how we play in the second half from the first play. We’ve got to get the crowd involved from the get-go. When we take the field, it’s got to have some type of energy. We’ve got to have some type of juice. We can’t wait until we’re down 17. We can’t wait until we’re down 13 to try to make a comeback.

“It’s too hard in this league. It’s too hard in this league. People are too good, schemes are too good. You don’t have enough time. So you can’t play from behind. You can’t come out here and have slow starts. I think that’s what we’re doing, and we’ve got to get it correct and have a faster start. Go with these questions.”

That statement accurately summed up both New England’s biggest problem so far this season and the sentiment of the Patriots’ locker room after Sunday’s defeat.

In Week 1 against the Philadelphia Eagles, the Patriots trailed 16-0 in the first quarter before staging an unsuccessful second-half rally and losing 25-20. They followed a similar script against Miami, falling behind 17-3 just before halftime before coming back late.

Twenty of their opponents’ 33 first-half points in those games came off Patriots turnovers.

In both contests, the Patriots had the ball in the closing minutes with a chance to win or tie and could not capitalize. Both final plays were agonizingly close, too: Kayshon Boutte getting one foot down but not the other on fourth-and-8 against Philly and Mike Gesicki’s desperation lateral to Cole Strange coming up inches short in Week 2.

Officials initially gave the Patriots a first down on both before overturning the calls after video reviews.

Despite some valid reasons for optimism on defense, offense and special teams, the Patriots are left sitting at 0-2 for the first time since 2001. Since 1990, teams that lost their first two games went on to make the playoffs just 11.5% of the time.

To buck those odds, New England needs to begin playing to the potential Judon knows it has.

“Something’s got to happen,” Judon said. “Something’s got to give. We’re not just going to be a pedestrian team that lets people score on us and we don’t score. We’re going to bow up. We’re going to have a backbone.”